Phone hacking scandal bill touches $200m for Murdoch's News Corp

Birmingham Star (ANI) Thursday 9th February, 2012

Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation has said the phone hacking scandal at News International has cost the group nearly 200 million dollars till date.

News Corp said it had booked an 87 million dollars charge in the final three months of 2011, "related to the costs of the ongoing investigations initiated upon the closure of The News of the World", taking the total cost of investigations to 104 million dollars.

The firm revealed that nearly 85percent of the charge are related to "fees to outside lawyers and advisers working on various investigations and committee hearings in the UK".

The remaining 15 percent are related to legal settlements, implying payouts to hacking victims of about 15 million dollars, The Telegraph reports.

News Corp had earlier disclosed a 91million dollars charge in its first quarter results, primarily related to restructuring its UK newspaper business following the closure of The News of the World amid the hacking scandal.

The embattled firm said that the loss of the tabloid was likely to contribute to a decline of at least 150 million dollars in annual revenue from the company's UK publishing business.

It said that the bill for hacking investigations was "substantially higher" than it had originally expected.

The company also said that they are not going to predict or target total expenditure, and would do what is necessary to make things right. (ANI)